


unsaid feelings (i love you too)

by draculard



Category: Star Wars: Thrawn Series - Timothy Zahn (2017)
Genre: Angst and Feels, Forbidden Love, Hurt No Comfort, Imperial Anti-Alien Sentiment, M/M, Mutual Pining, Repressed Emotions, Requited Unrequited Love, Xenophobia
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-11
Updated: 2020-04-11
Packaged: 2021-02-28 19:21:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,341
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23152432
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/draculard/pseuds/draculard
Summary: A new fraternization law bans relationships between aliens and humans in the Imperial military, regardless of rank. Eli finds notice of it hidden deep in the weekly memo from Imperial Center and can't explain why it makes his heart sink.After all, it's not like it applies to him.
Relationships: Thrawn | Mitth'raw'nuruodo/Eli Vanto
Comments: 28
Kudos: 129
Collections: It's All in the Name (Take #1)





	unsaid feelings (i love you too)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [inquisitor_tohru](https://archiveofourown.org/users/inquisitor_tohru/gifts).



Each week, Eli looked over the latest shipwide bulletins, reading through them with a thoroughness and attention to detail he knew was uncommon — but if there was anything he’d learned from Thrawn in the last four years, it was that attention to detail was always, without exception, necessary in the life of a warrior.

And especially so in the life of a supply officer, Eli privately thought.

He scanned the first section, which applied only to Imperial agents stationed on this ship — muster times, scheduled drills, inspection dates and staff changes. The second section, which applied to the fleet at large, was much shorter, with the last section — an Empire-wide release — taking up the most space. 

The new law was tucked away in the middle of it, buried in unimportant notices and minor adjustments to the military code. This, though — this wasn’t minor at all. Eli read it three times, his mouth going dry, his lips settling into a grim line.

A ban on alien-human relations within Imperial ranks. Banishment to penal colonies for all offenders, with subtle but unmistakable verbiage implying that only aliens would be considered true offenders; otherwise, Eli couldn’t explain why a law like this had the word ‘victim’ in it at all.

He shut his datapad off, mind racing, heart thumping a little too fast.

He should have seen it coming, really.

* * *

Before he went on shift, he locked the news up in the back of his brain, determined not to think of it again. He told himself it was inconsequential — for him, personally, at least. The law did not affect him directly; it only added to his growing list of quibbles with the Empire, a list he tried to ignore most days even as it shouted louder and louder inside him.

The enslaved Wookiees he’d seen — the prison camps for aliens only, many of whom hadn’t even broken laws — the violence he’d not quite witnessed himself, always hidden behind closed doors — the people who did their best to separate Eli from Thrawn at parties on Coruscant, sneers on their lips, a peculiar hardness in their eyes.

He pushed it all down and strode onto the bridge with his head held high. Thrawn stood at the viewport, hands clasped behind his back. He looked over his shoulder at Eli, but didn’t acknowledge his presence until they stood side-by-side.

Eli handed him the datapad silently. The Emperor’s notice was pulled up onscreen; the new stricture on alien-human fraternization had been highlighted in yellow. Thrawn glanced at it, reading it quickly and without expression. He handed the datapad back to Eli.

They didn’t talk about it.

* * *

Later, he found Thrawn in his command room with the lights dimmed, surrounded by the delicate blue light of holos. Thrawn stood in the middle of it all, his posture straight, his eyes far away. 

It was a long moment before either of them spoke.

“It is concerning,” Thrawn said, “but not unpredictable. Each of us has noted the pattern of xenophobic sentiment in the Empire.”

He said it tonelessly, like it was of little consequence to him — like it hadn’t dogged him every step of his career. Like it hadn’t affected Eli, either. 

“You’re not worried?” Eli asked, keeping his voice carefully modulated.

Thrawn glanced sideways at him and quirked an eyebrow. “I did say it was concerning,” he said dryly.

Eli shook his head and moved around Thrawn, taking a seat at the seldom-utilized desk in the corner of the room. He let his breath out in a sigh, realized what he was doing halfway through and forced himself to stop. He resisted the urge to rest his head in his hands, to massage the headache out of his temples.

“It doesn’t apply to _us,_ ” he said aloud.

Thrawn said nothing. He only looked at Eli, his face unreadable. It was impossible to tell whether he stared at Eli because he disagreed or because he was waiting for Eli to go on.

“Well, it doesn’t,” said Eli defensively — and, partially, because he knew it would motivate Thrawn to respond.

The response was exactly what he hoped for:

“Indeed not,” Thrawn said.

Eli couldn’t explain why those words didn’t bring him any relief. He rested his elbows on Thrawn’s desk and stared down at his hands, picking absently at his cuticles. “It’s a lot like fraternization rules,” he said, thinking aloud. “I mean, it _is_ a fraternization rule, really. It’s just we’ve never had a fraternization law based on — on _species_ before, instead of rank.”

Thrawn gazed at Eli a moment longer; then, without a word in response, he turned his attention back to the artwork before him. There was something about him — the firm set to his jaw, the far-away cast to his eyes — that made Eli think he was dwelling on the subject just as much as Eli was. 

“It means—” Eli started, then broke off, blushing a little at what he meant to say. At the presumptive quality of it, the casual intimacy that was common between friends. Most friends. “It means,” Eli said again, forcing himself to say it, “you can’t _ever_ have a relationship, really. Because there aren’t any alien officers within your rank bracket.”

And it went without saying that a civilian relationship was out of the cards for any member of the Imperial Navy — there simply wasn’t the time to cultivate one. Thrawn glanced at Eli again, favoring him with a dry smile. “Romance has never been to my taste,” he said.

That was probably true, Eli reflected. The only evidence he had to counter it was the heaviness in Thrawn’s voice, the slight twitch of his lips, the empty humor of that smile. 

As if he sensed Eli’s eyes on him, Thrawn lowered his chin, closed his eyes. “Romance has never been my _priority_ ,” he said softly, with light emphasis on the final word. He lifted his shoulders in a minuscule shrug and looked at Eli again. “This changes nothing,” he said.

Eli’s heart sank. He supposed it was true.

He heard himself say, “It changes everything for me.”

* * *

He was summoned back to the command room the following day; this time, the lights were up to full power and there were no holos in sight. Eli stood before Thrawn’s desk at parade rest; Thrawn stood on the other side, his head angled down, his eyes on a datapad screen.

“There are some precautions we must take,” said Thrawn without preamble, without looking up.

Eli thought of what he’d said last night — the almost-confession neither of them had acknowledged. His heart rate increased, but he didn’t flush.

“Precautions, sir?” he said.

Thrawn’s eyes flicked up. The glance felt strangely like a warning; Eli straightened up under the weight of it, adjusting his posture, trying to look more formal than he already did.

“The new strictures on alien-human relationships do not, of course, affect our own relationship,” said Thrawn, his voice neutral, “as we are nothing more than—” There was an almost unnoticeable hesitation. “—fellow officers,” Thrawn finished. “ _Esebanza nobo_.”

“Coworkers,” Eli translated.

“Precisely so. Nonetheless, I’m sure you’ve noticed the …” Again, Thrawn hesitated, looking down at his datapad. “...rumors following us these past four years.”

Eli’s mouth was dry. He couldn’t respond.

“As such,” said Thrawn, “I think it wise we take measures to safeguard your reputation.”

“ _My_ reputation,” Eli repeated, voice flat. Thrawn didn’t notice the emphasis; he opened his mouth to continue and seemed taken aback when Eli interrupted him. “It’s not my reputation that matters here, sir. You ought to know that. You read the notice, didn’t you?”

Thrawn said nothing, only eyeing Eli speculatively. He stayed silent as Eli powered his own datapad on and pulled the notice up.

“Perpetrators will face court-martial with a maximum sentence of life imprisonment in Rohase Station,” he read. “Victims of alien-human fraternization are advised to contact ISB.” He glanced up, met Thrawn’s eyes steadily. “Rohase Station, sir, is an alien-only labor camp,” Eli said. “They’re not planning to punish _humans_ for this. At least, no more than a little slap on the wrist. It’s aliens they’re after — that’s what they mean by ‘perpetrators’ and ‘victims.’ Aliens and humans. It’s _your_ reputation that’s on the line; it’s your entire career.”

“I,” said Thrawn blandly, “have done nothing wrong.”

His eyes were locked onto Eli’s. Eli couldn’t look away.

“What precautions?” asked Eli finally, defeated, his voice no more than a whisper. Thrawn stared at him a moment longer, his lips tight, like there was something he was forcing himself not to say. Slowly, he turned his gaze back to the datapad; he looked at it blankly a while longer, his eyes not moving, his jaw clenched.

But when he spoke, his voice was even and calm.

“From now on, we shall no longer meet each other in my private quarters,” he said, “nor in yours. You may have noticed the vagueness of the Emperor’s mandate; prosecutable acts are not strictly defined. As such, I believe it’s best if we meet only in my command room or aft bridge office.”

Eli nodded, his throat tight. They’d never _done_ anything in Thrawn’s quarters, of course — they’d only met there a handful of times, always to discuss strategy or pore over datawork — but it struck him as a loss, somehow. 

“We shall forego any missions together planet-side,” Thrawn continued, eyes glued to his datapad. “It’s best to avoid even the possibility of indiscretion; I suggest, if we are summoned to Coruscant again, we enlist other officers to accompany us along the way. Furthermore—”

He cut himself off; Eli was shaking his head, his arms raised in an angry, hopeless shrug. Thrawn eyed him, silently waiting for Eli to speak, and all Eli could do was keep shaking his head, mouth curved into a smile full of nothing but hate and frustration, his lips parted and nothing coming out.

Silently, Thrawn darkened his datapad screen, abandoning what Eli could only assume was an entire list of ‘precautions.’ He couldn’t force himself to appreciate the gesture; emotions were bubbling up inside his chest, strangling any words that might have come out.

“Commander,” said Thrawn delicately, “I understand—”

“You don’t.” It came out sharper than Eli meant it to; he shut his mouth with a snap, opened it again, shook his head. “You don’t,” he said again, softer this time but still firm. “Romance isn’t to your taste, remember?”

He’d crossed the line into dangerous territory, he knew. He bit the inside of his cheek and stared resolutely at his commanding officer, his senses heightened, waiting for Thrawn to acknowledge what Eli had confessed. He was ready for the acknowledgment to come verbally — he was ready for it to come as a flicker in Thrawn’s expression or as a minute sigh; anything, any sign at all.

For a long time, nothing came. 

“Do you think me completely unobservant?” said Thrawn at last. His voice was soft, and although Eli couldn’t identify the emotion in it, it was more human than anything he’d ever heard. Thrawn’s eyes were fixed on Eli’s face as though he were memorizing it — or studying it — and Eli couldn’t be sure if what he saw was better labeled as sadness or as pity.

His heart thumped in his ears, threatening to deafen him. His face flushed as the words sunk in.

Thrawn knew.

“You know my goals,” Thrawn said, his voice quiet, his words precise. “You are aware of what’s at stake; I cannot afford to place my reputation or my rank in danger, where the Emperor is concerned. I understand you are not subject to the same amount of scrutiny, and that the consequences to you and your people may not seem as dire.”

It was unbearable to have this conversation now, under these circumstances. Eli swallowed and closed his eyes for a moment, everything in him shaking to pieces under the combination of Thrawn’s words and his unreadable gaze. 

“Do you understand,” said Thrawn heavily, “what I’m trying to say?”

Eli opened his eyes. Minutes passed, and during that time Thrawn fiddled almost nervously with the datapad in his hands, his eyes fixed unseeing on a point somewhere past Eli’s shoulder. His face was almost unreadable — almost blank — but the planes of it flexed unconsciously, forming expressions Eli had never seen on him before and yet knew all too well. His heart lurched at the indecision written across Thrawn’s face; his pulse quickened when he watched those features soften into an expression of something like sadness, something adjacent to wistfulness.

It all caved under the look that eventually subsumed them all — a hopelessness so final that Eli’s heart sank at the sight of it. As soon as Thrawn’s vacant eyes focused and met Eli’s, he dropped his gaze. He opened his mouth to speak and then hesitated, letting the silence wear on another minute.

“Eli,” he said eventually, “I hoped it went without saying.”

Eli’s mouth was dry. He was trembling so minutely he wasn’t sure Thrawn could tell; beneath his uniform, he was flushed and covered in sweat, yet he felt chilled to the bone and weary like he’d run for miles to get here.

“Just coworkers,” he said at length. Thrawn looked at him in something almost like dismay. “That’s what you said,” Eli reminded him. “The law doesn’t apply to us because we’re nothing more than fellow officers. Just coworkers.”

Thrawn inclined his head in a minute nod. “And that’s all we'll ever be,” he said firmly.

“Yes,” said Eli, “you explained as much.”

Only he’d done so without explaining anything. He’d confessed without ever admitting to feeling a thing.

His self-control was, as always, impeccable. No one in their crew, except Eli, would ever see the hint of sadness in his eyes. In silent, perfect understanding of each other, Thrawn handed Eli his datapad, allowing him to read over the list of precautions for himself. Eli took it with a nod of gratitude.

Their fingers touched.

That was all. 


End file.
